It's like high school holds two different worlds, revolving around each other an never touching; the haves and the have-nots. I guess it's a good thing. High school is supposed to prepare you for the real world, after all.

And for a moment―for a split second―everything else falls away, the whole pattern and order of my life, and a huge joy crests in my chest. I am no one, and I owe nothing to anybody, and my life is my own.

Most of the time-- 99 percent of the time-- you just don't know how and why the threads are looped together, and that's okay. Do a good thing and something bad happens. Do a bad thing and something good happens. Do nothing and everything explodes.

Black is too morbid; red will set them on edge; pink is too juvenile; orange is freakish

What does it feel like to be infected?" "I-- I can't describe it." I force the words out. Can't breathe, can't breathe, can't breathe. His skin smells like smoke from a wood fire, like soap, like heaven. I imagine tasting his skin; I imagine biting his lips. "I want to know." His words are a whisper, barely audible. "I want to know with you.

I start to follow her, and Alex grabs my hand. "I'll find you," he says, watching me with the eyes I remember. "I won't let you go again." I don't trust myself to speak. Instead I nod, hoping that he understands me. He squeezes my hand. "Go," he says.

I remember a story I once heard about drowning: that when you fall into cold water it's not that you drown right away but that the cold disorients you and makes you think that down is up and up is down, so you may be swimming, swimming, swimming for your life in the wrong direction, all the way toward the bottom until you sink. That's how I feel, as though everything has been turned around.